Small Steps to a Realized Truth
by The Middle Captain
Summary: The story of a girl and a boy, growing and understanding each other, living with ambitions and dreams, and the intersection of two destinies. ONESHOT


When she first saw him, it was on the street. Her father had asked her to walk with him, and they strolled through the market districts. Most of the people bowed to them, but the boy hadn't. He was short, but he was noticeable. His outfit was orange after all.

* * *

She found out that the boy was the target of her sister's affections after following Hinata for a day and spending the good part of an hour trailing her, while she trailed him. He trained in poor bastardizations of taijutsu and ninjutsu techniques. This boy was a loser! Well, her sister was a loser, so she supposed it made sense for the losers to end up together.

* * *

When Hinata's genin teams were announced, Hinata had been in a sour mood. She wasn't on the same team as **him.** The thought had infuriated her. So, in her anger, she confronted her sister. "Well, what has you so upset?"

"Oh! Hanabi-chan, you startled me! Uh-um, n-nothing"

"Are you sad you aren't on the same team as that boy in the orange?"

"W-what?! N-Naruto-kun? Not at all."

"Then why do you follow him around?"

"Hanabi h-have you been following me? Why?"

"I was curious as to why my sister, the heir of our clan, wasn't training. It was a surprise that she spends her time watching loser boys."

"Naruto-kun isn't a loser! He's the strongest person I've ever met!"

"Hmph. Not from what I've seen."

That was the last time she and Hinata talked for a while.

After Hinata's performance against Neji in the Chuunin Exam preliminaries, the only Hyuuga left in the running was Neji-nii-san and he was fighting the boy in the first round. The sound beating that was insured by Neji was just the thing to snap her sister out of the crush she had.

But it wasn't to be. The loser had won. She supposed the strength of Neji Hyuuga was a myth after all. He wasn't going to be able to help her on her quest for power.

* * *

After the Chuunin Exams, and after the Uchiha had betrayed the village and he had left, she challenged Neji to a one-on-one fight, and was crushed terribly by the older boy's power. She began feeling a bit of sorrow at herself.

* * *

The next years that followed were very dull for her. She had to join the academy and then her sister and cousin had advanced in level to chuunin, and then Neji advanced even further to jonin. She knew her power needed increasing, so she trained incredibly hard. Her quest was simple, but necessary. She had to crush him.

* * *

All she thought about during training was him. He was stronger than Neji, but since he had left, he must be training even more, and now under a sannin. She trained every day, and then when he returned, she knew what she had to do.

* * *

"Konohamaru? Is that you? I can't play right now, I'm training my wind chakra."

"I am not Sarutobi."

"Hinata? Wait, no, that isn't right."

"I am Hanabi Hyuuga, you cretin!"

"Cretin? What's that?"

"It means that you're an idiot!"

"Why didn't you say that then? You… Firework-Girl!"

"Firework-Girl? Tha- I CHALLENGE YOU TO A DUEL!"

"A duel? I don't have any trading cards Firework-Girl."

"I mean a fight! Prepare yourself!"

After she had been beaten, she sulked on the forest floor.

"Listen, Firework-Girl, I-"

"What?" She looked at him, and she felt herself about to cry. Her power had been almost nothing against his. She hadn't even touched him.

"Um. You're really good, and I think that you should keep training to be even stronger. If you want, you can come here and spar against one of my clones while I train. How does that sound?"

She felt a little bit better.

* * *

After she trained with her father, she departed the complex to see him, and train, and it continued like this for some time. Occasionally he'd tell her he was going on a mission, and then she'd train by herself in their spot. Then he'd return with news about a grand adventure, but he'd always have somber moments in the story. The death of the kazekage, his friend. His failure to return the younger Uchiha traitor. The death of Sarutobi's uncle. The death of the sannin, Jiraiya. He mourned for his loss, and she looked on from afar, unable to comfort her rival. Then, he left.

* * *

The invasion was seen by her in the protection of the Hokage monument. She watched her comrades fall to the warrior known as Pain. The hokage, even at her strongest, couldn't defeat the entity. Then he appeared. A knight riding into battle with a billowing cape behind him. She watched him, fighting the evil, and then being trapped. Hinata, flying into battle to fight for the man she loved. The death of her sister. Then she turned off her Byakugan, and closed her eyes.

* * *

When she saw her sister, she knew he was responsible. Hinata told her of the proclamation of love she had made, and then how he had saved them all.

* * *

Then the war, and all it revealed, and cost. Neji died. But the world at large was peaceful.

It didn't last.

* * *

He ended up telling Hinata that he accepted her feelings, and the two began a relationship.

This irritated her, and she avoided them. She trained and became a part of a genin team, and that helped her advance to a chuunin faster than anyone in the Hyuuga clan had in over a decade. She was happy. Happy enough to begin training with him again. He would regale her with stories of success and adventures, and she even joined him on one or two of these missions. They reached a symbiosis. She needed his company, and he liked hers.

* * *

When he told her of his intention to marry Hinata, she was 18, he was 23. The hokage was going to name him as her successor sooner or later, even the Uchiha admitted while it was an ambition to become hokage, he would do a better job. She was getting a reputation as well. 'The Hyuuga Firecracker'. He promised her a high position in his guard when she became a jonin, and she said, "No thank you, I'll earn it." They laughed, but she felt a deep sorrow. She knew that her position was exactly what she had observed in her sister's, and pondered if unrequited was going to be a permanent fixture whenever she thought about romantic love. He told her that he and Hinata had been assigned a mission, and that he planned to propose after the mission ended. The next day the two set off.

* * *

For the next months, she thought about the two, and prepared to replace he and Hinata in her head. The two. Multiple represented by singular. It made her feel sorrow, but it also made her train harder. She was going to make jonin, and become useful to him- the two of them.

* * *

When the two returned, it was not as the pair, but only him.

* * *

He became a recluse. The rumors spread, and without his presence it was hard for her to not believe Hinata had died by his hands. She started leaving the compound less and less, as months passed, until her father proved he was a genius, and told her the circumstances of Hinata's death. The remnant of Sound had captured Hinata, stolen her sister away, and when he came, he demolished the whole place, and found her sister, cut open and experimented upon. He took Hinata away, destroyed the remnant, and tried to save her sister, but Hinata had become mindless and lost. Hinata began rampaging, destroying with foreign chakra, and he had to kill her sister. He had told her father that Hinata had shone through in the end, and told him that he needed to keep loving.

When she knocked on his door, she didn't expect an answer, but she got one.

"Well, are you here to tell me how I failed you?" He reeked of body odor, alcohol, smoke, and soup. His clothes were stained with ash, beer, and other various liquids. He hadn't shaved, and a blonde beard, spiky like his hair, was present over the whisker marks he usually had bare.

"No, I'm here to-"

"No? That's a laugh and a half, Firework." His breath was pungent, and the affectionate nickname was spat at her. "I killed Hinata, and you don't think I failed you?" He pulls from a burning cigarette and exhales. "You know, it's funny how much 'love' can forgive, isn't it? Sakura forgave Sasuke, and the second he decides this village is 'good enough' he takes her into his life. That's why I started dating Hinata you know. To make Sakura jealous. She didn't get jealous though, she only ever had eyes for Sasuke. That bastard." He pulls and exhales again. "And you. You let your little crush on me blind you from my faults, and my responsibilities. DON'T YOU GET IT HANABI? I KILLED HER!"

She looks at him, and sees the tears flowing down his face. "What do you want me to do to you Naruto?"

He blanches, looking at her with bloodshot eyes, crying at the memory if a loved one. "I… I don't know." His gaze falls. "You can come in if you like. I'll put on tea." The apartment is in shambles. The only things untouched are little remnants of Hinata's hand in his apartment, a few throw pillows, a special tea set, a few plants, a picture of the two of them on a date. She sits down in a chair, after putting it on its legs, and pulls up to his table. She's been here a few times, to eat a dinner with the two, or to goad him into helping her train. He brings back the tea, and puts a cup in front of her, then pours her some.

"You aren't the first to come and see me."

"Did you goad them into attacking you as well?"

"Some. Others didn't need it." She smiles. This is a dose of the interaction she's been deprived of.

"What about Hokage?"

"I'm still on as successor I suppose, but Tsunade has taken me off active duty. I told her I didn't need it, but she said she doesn't need me killing myself with work."

"Who visited?"

"Lee, Kiba, Shino, Sakura and Sasuke, Shikamaru, Iruka-sensei, Kakashi-sensei, some others. Most just stopped to see if I was okay. Others, well…" He let the sentence trail off, and she understood. "I had a mean black eye for a while after Kiba visited."

"Naruto, I don't blame you for her death."

"Ugh. Love isn't an answer Hanabi, sometimes people are bad, and-"

"My feelings for you aren't why I don't blame you. I hated you. I couldn't even think about you without wanting to kill you. My father told me the real story."

"The real- Sound?"

"Yes."

"That's an S-ranked secret Firework, Granny doesn't want anyone to know there was a new sound movement."

"I don't think I'll tell anyone."

"You shouldn't. Penalty of death and all that."

"I became a Jonin."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I figured you might not know, we haven't spoken in eleven months."

"Good for you." A small smile reaches his face. "I guess I've found my new guard."

She smiles too.

* * *

"The Rokudaime Hokage, can anyone tell me about him?" Udon surveyed his class, and almost every child had their hand raised. "Great! I'm glad everybody knows about our leader! How about you Itachi, what can you tell us?"

"He was the man who stopped Pain from destroying Konoha."

"Good! How about you, Inoko?"

"He holds the Kyuubi, Kurama, inside him."

"Excellent. What about you, Jiraiya?"

"He's the greatest ninja, and the strongest ninja, ever!"

"No he isn't! My dad is!"

"Shut up Itachi! Your dad couldn't lick my dad's sandals!"

Udon grinned exasperatedly, wouldn't these two kids ever stop arguing?

* * *

AUTHOR'S NOTE

So, this happened. I was reading a fic, and this idea hit me, so I wrote it. I don't really think it's too good, and I'm really not a fan of this pairing, but I liked the dynamic. A more brazen, Hinata-esque character falling in love with Naruto. I might write some Tales of Marriage or something, but I'm pretty sure this baby is a oneshot.


End file.
